


Red

by pickingoutchinapatterns



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Unremarkable house, set post s10, very sugary sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 10:13:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13292670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pickingoutchinapatterns/pseuds/pickingoutchinapatterns
Summary: Scully surprises Mulder with a gift at the unremarkable house.





	Red

Author’s note:  Originally, I was going to have this set this at their bench.  Right now though, I’m feeling very sappy so unremarkable house it is.  (I also think that we could use some sap after MSIII.) 

 

It’s a slightly chilly late spring evening as Mulder drives slowly home. He smiles, playing with the note she left on their desk as the scent of flowers and fresh earth blow in through his open window.

_“Meet me at home for dinner at 7:30 for a very early or very late birthday present. – S.”_

_Yes, home_ , he thinks.  Things had been changing for the better recently.  They were back in the basement, growing together again.  She spent more evenings at home than at that other apartment (he still refuses to refer to it as hers), slowly moving back in as she waits for the lease to expire. She’d slept over last night, but he hasn’t seen her all day; he’s looking forward to whatever she has up her sleeve. The note was next to the coffee maker this morning, on top of one of his ancient, beloved ties (ugly ties, according to her, but he thought they had character).  He decided to wear that tie to work today – maybe part of her secretly missed his old wardrobe choices.

He’s happy, he thinks, finally seeing their gate ahead of him.  He’s almost surprised to think it: 25 years together and he’s…at peace. He takes a deep breath of fresh air, gets out of the car, and starts walking.  He stops short when he sees her rocking in the swinging bench on their front porch.  She has obviously been busy.

The porch has flower baskets hanging from freshly screwed-in hooks.  The banister is similarly decorated with railing planters stuffed full with newly planted flowers of different varieties.  There are three balloons tied to each end of the swinging bench, bracketing her as if she was either the birthday girl or the gift. She even has food laid out beside her on a small wooden table and her big overnight bag on the other side.  As he jogs up to her, he experiences a fleeting moment of panic, wondering if there was an anniversary or something that he forgot about.  Scully isn’t usually this demonstrative and he feels a bit guilty for meeting her empty handed, but the feeling vanishes when she looks up from fiddling the with food to see him, and smiles that special smile.

“Scully,” he grins, at a loss for words.

She blushes and shrugs.  “I’ve been thinking lately that even though we’ve always considered this house ours, I haven’t always acted like it was in the last few years.  I thought it was time to officially reclaim it.  Are you hungry?”

“Famished,” he replies, his smile brightening even further.

“Dig in then.”

They eat in companionable silence, enjoying each other’s presence – it’s Friday, they have the whole weekend ahead of them, and neither of them are in any rush.  The wind picks up and Scully shivers, her hair blowing wildly in her face.  Before Mulder has a chance to brush it aside, she reaches into her bag and pulls out her old, big puffy winter jacket.  Mulder laughs.

“I didn’t know you still had that!”

“I found it in one of the boxes at Mom’s.  I thought bringing it over today would be appropriate,” she smiles slyly at him.

“Oh, why is that?  Were you looking to recreate some of our early days tonight with slightly different endings?”  He leers at her, leaning in closer. 

Scully chuckles, kisses him chastely, then stands and walks behind him.  She wraps her arms around his neck from behind and whispers seductively in his ear.  “We could do something like that later, but I had something else in mind when I left you that note.”

Mulder shivers, feeling his groin twitch and trying to suppress the urge to turn and kiss her like their lives depended on it.  _25 years and she still does this to me,_ he thinks.  He feels her shift behind him and hears her rooting around in her coat pocket. 

“Close your eyes,” she whispers after kissing him behind the ear.  He obeys and feels her awkwardly trying to put a pair of glasses on him.  She chuckles as she tries, then stands beside him as she positions them better on his face.  “OK, you can open them now.”

He opens his eyes, wondering briefly why she got him a pair of sunglasses -- she knows that he already owns several -- when suddenly he realizes…

“What the hell?!?”  He scrambles up, looking around him, at the flowers, at the balloons, at the trees, at the grass, the sky, at his beloved (and yes, godawful) tie.  It’s so much to take in, it’s so…VIVID.  He peeks under the glasses and then pushes them back into place over and over again.

Scully smiles, enjoying his reaction.  “I found out about these a little while ago and decided to surprise you.  I thought there was no better way than to do this here, at our home, so that you could enjoy it for the first time.”

Mulder looks over at her and sees… purple.  And blue.  And pink.  “Scully, did that jacket always look like that?”  She laughs as he paws at it like it’s a unknown specimen.  He turns again to the flowers, seeing the vibrant shades of red, yellow, orange, violet…..for the first time.  He never knew the trees were so…green.  He turns to Scully again and then freezes, his mouth gaping open and then closing over and over again.  Scully moves closer to him, one hand holding his while the other caresses his face, wiping away a tear that is slowly rolling down his cheek.

“Mulder, are you OK?  Should I have warned you first?  Is this too much?”

“Red.”

She nods, looking around at their surroundings.  “I tried to bring as many different colours as I could find.  I even have some paint swatches in my bag.”  She begins to bend down again before he stops her, shaking his head.  She looks back up at him, the tear track still glistening on his awed face.

“All these years…..God Scully…all..I….” he takes deep breaths.  She steps closer, wanting to comfort him, not knowing that this moment would overwhelm him so much. 

“Mulder it’s ok.  You can take them off if this is too much.  I shouldn’t have surprised you like that.  I should have…”  she stops when he shakes his head “no” earnestly.

“Scully, all these years and I never knew just how devastatingly beautiful you were.  …I mean, I always knew you were so devastatingly beautiful but you’re so VIBRANT.  Your eyes are so BLUE.  But your hair, your hair Scully…..I never knew….”  He runs his fingers through her hair, marvelling at how the light glints off of it, making it seem alive with colour.  It’s gold, it’s red, it’s fire, it’s … Scully. 

They kiss, both of them emotional now.  Mulder, slightly embarrassed, attempts to diffuse the situation by asking her if she gave him this gift so that he would be able to tell the difference between human and alien blood.  Scully huffs a laugh, rolling her eyes, quipping that she wants him to avoid as many hospital stays as possible.

Eventually, they sit back on their bench, wrapped up in each other, Mulder pulling back every now and then to play with her hair.  Eventually Scully looks to the horizon.  She catches and squeezes Mulder’s fingers, halting their thousandth progression through her hair. 

“Mulder, look at the sky.  I want you to experience the sunset with me.”

He humors her, glancing at the light show in the sky and agreeing that it’s amazing, but he can’t help his eyes being drawn back to her; he kisses her forehead, and then rests his own there. "Nothing could possibly compare to what I’m seeing now.”

They sit together on their bench long after Mars and Venus appear in the sky. 

 

Inspired by these glasses: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wuC_RX4xi4

Notes:  I never liked the whole red-green colour blindness being canon.  I did think that this could be a way of changing it.  (If you’ve never seen it, there are many videos on youtube of colourblind people being able to see colour for the first time while wearing these special glasses.  For example: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TROCGz5qvmw>  and <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJ6YV9-qxmg>.)  Please let me know what you thought!

Please note that the author is not responsible for the development of DM2 or cavities from the overload of sappy sweetness.


End file.
